


Bread Basket

by Infestation



Category: My Little Pony: Friendship is Magic
Genre: Gen, Horror, Implied Cannibalism, Self-Mutilation, implied anyway, some violence
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2015-05-25
Updated: 2015-05-25
Packaged: 2018-04-01 03:02:11
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence
Chapters: 1
Words: 788
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/4003360
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Infestation/pseuds/Infestation
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>"A shop opens in a small village in Equestria..."</p>
            </blockquote>





	Bread Basket

**Author's Note:**

> Written in 2013, just found on my phone.

\---

A shop opens in a small village in Equestria. It's run by a pale orange pony. "The Bread Basket. It was my dream to open my own shop, some day."   
There is something strange about this new pony. It's face lacks the sweet curves of a mare, the hard angles of a stallion. The body is covered, nose to flank, with thick robes. It is without the telltale lumps of a pegasai's covered wings or the confident stance of an earth pony. It never uses magic, no glowing horn under it's deep hood. Yet the body is clearly not that of a donkey, or a zebra. Perhaps it's mother was a mule, or zonkey, though no one dares to say this openly, only whispered behind closed doors or raised hooves. Perhaps a donkey, ugly though prolific as they are, successfully bedded some other colourful pony half cousin.  
It's not an ugly pony, by what little it shows. No scars or mottled fur or rheumey eyes, though the state of it's mane is unknown. Hidden like all but it's hooves and face. Even the hooves are well trimmed, though not polished, fetlocks uncut.  
It's strange, so none of the townsfolk have talked about anything but it and it's shop since the day "The Bread Basket" opened it's doors.  
The shop is also strange. It's not a bakery, or a basket shop, or a shop that sells baskets *for*bakeries. It's only open late in the evening and early morning. Closed between dawn and dusk and dawn again. Never during the full light of day, or the full dark of night.  
"Personal reasons," is the owner's answer, "My basket is half full, so my shop is only half open." Their voice could be joking, but it's hard to tell. It's soft, and rasps like scales over sand, or maybe autumn leaves in the street. Quiet. Dry.  
The shelves are filled with containers of preserved "sweets," though no one can identify what they once were. Sold in jars and boxes and little bags with ribbons for the foals. Soft, chewy lumps of dark purple and red. Stringy orange strips. Spongy off-pink cubes.  
"Sweets."  
They are sweet, though. And the shop isn't unpopular.   
People stop talking, after a while. The shopkeeper is pleasant if strange, the sweets good if unidentifiable. New drama takes ponies attentions, seasons change, and "The Bread Basket" becomes a fond local oddity.  
\- -  
Every few days, deliveries are made to the shop. Unmarked crates that clink and rattle with new stock, dropped off by sleepy-eyed delivery pegasai before the shop opens again near dawn. Some enterprising mares wake early for the morning hours.  
The sweets taste a bit saltier in the morning, fresh from the unknown supplier.   
"It's a family business," the shopkeeper confesses, bagging sweets and collecting bits, "They make everything I sell."   
\- -  
A larger shipment than usual comes the night before Hearts and Hooves Day. The shop stays open from dawn until dusk, the shopkeeper pressing free sweets into the hooves of happy couples.  
And their voice is a pleasant susurrus, "Please, take one more," in the ears of every customer, "from my basket to yours," until the guards arrive.  
\- -  
The thing dragged through the streets is barely a pony. Barely *alive.* Stripped bare, the hollow where it's belly should have been is revealed. Everything scooped out and stitched shut. Sold in jars and boxes and little bags with ribbons for the foals.   
The cracked hide of its throat flutters with it's screams, and it's face tears open to reveal fangs like knives, like a rusted bear trap springing in reverse.   
It's eyes shatter on the cobblestone street, only glass, when the guards rear up and slam it's head to the ground. It's stringy mane litters the street, torn out in knotted clumps.  
Somewhere, a foal is crying.  
The thing stops screaming with a clank of metal- shod hooves meeting stone. Few are surprised to see it's skull empty as it's abdomen.  
\- -  
Everyone is examined by Equestria's finest doctors and mages, the village monitored for weeks afterwards. No one feels sick. No one dies, or changes, or feels anything beyond horrified shock. They've been eating these "sweets" for months. Specialists talk to the foals. The couples who were in the shop. Anyone who feels they need someone to talk to.  
It doesn't help. Ponies start leaving. Their homes, their families, the village itself. They just leave. Quietly, at dawn, or dusk, without a word as to why.  
Some don't come back.  
Some do.  
Only one comes back with answers.  
\- -  
A shop opens in a small village in Equestria. The chain is becoming quite popular, despite the odd hours. "Please, try a sample. From our basket to yours."

\---

**Author's Note:**

> The "bread basket" is where all your squishy organs are, and "sweet breads" (or sweet *meats*) are the edible ones. Most of this is ambiguious on purpose, but... Yes, this was a fic about mummified ponies selling their preserved organs to convert living ponies. Thank you for reading..!


End file.
